Google finally enters the online storage arena with a free 1GB

The Official Google Blog and the Official Google Docs Blog have announced 1GB of free online storage for files that you are not obliged to convert it into one of the not-quite-Office-compatible Google Docs formats (ie Google documents, spreadsheets, and presentations). This is a miserly amount of space -- it's what Gmail offered at launch, and pathetic compared to the 25GB that Microsoft has been offering with its Windows Live SkyDrive -- but Google says "you can buy additional storage for $0.25 per GB per year", or $3.50 per GB per year for premium users.

Google's offering lacks either the capacity or the features of the DropBox service, which provides 2GB of space plus synchronisation, and there are plenty of alternatives such as Mozy, Sugarsync and Wuala. As mentioned on the Google Enterprise Blog, you can get your Google Docs storage synced separately via Memeo Connect, and backed up via Syncplicity, if you're a paying user. But it still looks a long way from being the fabled Gdrive, whatever TechCrunch says.

Since Google has been offering online storage with Google Docs and Picasa (and Google Storage) for some time, it's not clear why it's now entering the field with a market-trailing service.

However, a bit of speculation suggests the following. First, as Google says, you will be able to share files that Google Docs can't handle, presumably including avi and MP3. That is clearly useful. Second, Google Docs can be a problem for companies sharing Microsoft Office files, because the features you lose when you convert to Google's formats you can never get back. Google Docs storage will now let people share those files.

And third…. Google is planning to launch ChromeOS, where computers run a Chrome browser but have no permanent local storage: everything is done "in the cloud". Google probably does not plan to tell those folks to go somewhere else to store their files, so at that point it will need an online storage offering.

However, don't take Google's suggestion -- "You might even be able to replace the USB drive you reserved for those files that are too big to send over email." -- too literally.

Yes, it's true, you might, if you've somehow failed to notice the odd dozen fast file-sharing services such as RapidShare, MegaUpload and YouSendIt. But if you only have one copy of data, you have no backup and could lose it at any second. This might happen sooner than Google going bust or disappearing into a hole in the ground (if another Great Quake hits California), because your Google account can be hacked or else Google can decide to terminate your ID for whatever reasons.

This also applies, of course, to Microsoft, Yahoo (including Flickr), and every other online storage and service provider.

So whichever online apps you use, you should also keep copies of all your data files either on your local hard drive, on CD/DVD or on a USB thumb drive, and for preference, all three. Emailing them via Gmail also works.